Composition in the digital age: are works replicable? What does it mean to compose?

[BluMunk]

(random and unorganized musings, sort of sparked by another thread with a demo of an orchestral library which recorded 1,000,000 trombones and 9,000 violins)

 

It seems that these days a significant amount of music is never 'scored' in the traditional sense. A DAW is a compositional tool, and the final piece of music might never be played by musicians- simply crafted and exported from the computer.

 

Recordings (which itself is an antiquated misnomer in this context) become the historical artifact of this type of composition, not pages of sheet music.

 

I suppose that in popular music forms, this has always been true? Any sheet music created is often done after the fact because there's a market for it, but a complete score is not necessary (in most cases) for the creation of 20th century popular music.

 

But, in the DAW-composition world, you now can write for 100 instruments without having to have written instructions for any of them. And there is no practical limitation to the number 

 

Which gets to part 1 of my question: a person can perhaps listen to a Beatles track and re-construct every piece by ear. For a symphonic composition, that is an infinitely more challenging task. If I've written a piece in-DAW for symphony, and lose my projects (or the software becomes unstable/unusable over decades of technological changes), and all I have are the audio tracks/finished piece, are details of the work "lost"? 

 

Similarly, it seems that a lot of composition is about using unique instruments... many of which don't exist in physical form. Maybe it's a specific synth with specific parameters, or a specific sample with fx. If those instrument definitions aren't explicitly defined, what happens if someone else tries to perform the piece? Does it become a new arrangement if I have a flute play a melody as opposed to the clarinet as defined by the composer? What about if I use Omnisphere instead of an Iridium? What about track automation?

 

I guess in my mind the art of "composition" has always felt separate than the art of making the music itself. If I'm composing, I'm creating something that others can take and perform. 

 

I watch videos of people composing in their computers, and they really seem to be composing AND performing AND mixing all at the same time. And elements of 'production' have become compositional tools themselves. Is old-style composition dead? Is sheet music with imprecise dynamic and tempo markings, relatively simple performance instructions, and commonly standardized instruments inadequate in the modern musical landscape?

 

Or, to get back to the thought that sparked all this: "if I have an orchestral library that recorded 66 trombones at once, and I use that library, am I 'composing a piece for 66 trombones', or maybe 'composing a piece for a sample of 66 trombones because 66 trombones in real life would require a different approach to composition'... or am I in fact doing something less specific: writing for trombones of an indeterminate number, and this sample library just sounds good to me? It's the sound of 'many' trombones, and I picked it kind of at random. What does it mean for composition when the details of my instrumentation can be so wildly imprecise and arbitrary?"

[ProfD]

56 minutes ago, BluMunk said:

Recordings (which itself is an antiquated misnomer in this context) become the historical artifact of this type of composition, not pages of sheet music.

Recordings took the place of sheet music in providing a document of how a composition was played and how it should sound.

 

56 minutes ago, BluMunk said:

If I've written a piece in-DAW for symphony, and lose my projects (or the software becomes unstable/unusable over decades of technological changes), and all I have are the audio tracks/finished piece, are details of the work "lost"? 

Nope.  The audio file is proof of the composition.

56 minutes ago, BluMunk said:

Similarly, it seems that a lot of composition is about using unique instruments... many of which don't exist in physical form. Maybe it's a specific synth with specific parameters, or a specific sample with fx. If those instrument definitions aren't explicitly defined, what happens if someone else tries to perform the piece? Does it become a new arrangement if I have a flute play a melody as opposed to the clarinet as defined by the composer? What about if I use Omnisphere instead of an Iridium? What about track automation?

Same composition if the melody and harmony are kept intact.

56 minutes ago, BluMunk said:

I guess in my mind the art of "composition" has always felt separate than the art of making the music itself. If I'm composing, I'm creating something that others can take and perform. 

The art of making music involves some type of composition.

56 minutes ago, BluMunk said:

I watch videos of people composing in their computers, and they really seem to be composing AND performing AND mixing all at the same time. And elements of 'production' have become compositional tools themselves. Is old-style composition dead? Is sheet music with imprecise dynamic and tempo markings, relatively simple performance instructions, and commonly standardized instruments inadequate in the modern musical landscape?

Technological advances have always made it easier to compose and play and perform music.

 

Old style composition isn't dead.  As surely as there are folks still recording to 2 inch tape, there's a composer sitting at a piano mocking up a score by hand.😎

[David Emm]

On 5/29/2024 at 9:25 AM, BluMunk said:

(random and unorganized musings, sort of sparked by another thread with a demo of an orchestral library which recorded 1,000,000 trombones and 9,000 violins)

 

It seems that these days a significant amount of music is never 'scored' in the traditional sense. A DAW is a compositional tool, and the final piece of music might never be played by musicians- simply crafted and exported from the computer.

 

Recordings (which itself is an antiquated misnomer in this context) become the historical artifact of this type of composition, not pages of sheet music.

 

I suppose that in popular music forms, this has always been true? Any sheet music created is often done after the fact because there's a market for it, but a complete score is not necessary (in most cases) for the creation of 20th century popular music.

 

But, in the DAW-composition world, you now can write for 100 instruments without having to have written instructions for any of them. And there is no practical limitation to the number 

 

Which gets to part 1 of my question: a person can perhaps listen to a Beatles track and re-construct every piece by ear. For a symphonic composition, that is an infinitely more challenging task. If I've written a piece in-DAW for symphony, and lose my projects (or the software becomes unstable/unusable over decades of technological changes), and all I have are the audio tracks/finished piece, are details of the work "lost"? 

 

Similarly, it seems that a lot of composition is about using unique instruments... many of which don't exist in physical form. Maybe it's a specific synth with specific parameters, or a specific sample with fx. If those instrument definitions aren't explicitly defined, what happens if someone else tries to perform the piece? Does it become a new arrangement if I have a flute play a melody as opposed to the clarinet as defined by the composer? What about if I use Omnisphere instead of an Iridium? What about track automation?

 

I guess in my mind the art of "composition" has always felt separate than the art of making the music itself. If I'm composing, I'm creating something that others can take and perform. 

 

I watch videos of people composing in their computers, and they really seem to be composing AND performing AND mixing all at the same time. And elements of 'production' have become compositional tools themselves. Is old-style composition dead? Is sheet music with imprecise dynamic and tempo markings, relatively simple performance instructions, and commonly standardized instruments inadequate in the modern musical landscape?

 

Or, to get back to the thought that sparked all this: "if I have an orchestral library that recorded 66 trombones at once, and I use that library, am I 'composing a piece for 66 trombones', or maybe 'composing a piece for a sample of 66 trombones because 66 trombones in real life would require a different approach to composition'... or am I in fact doing something less specific: writing for trombones of an indeterminate number, and this sample library just sounds good to me? It's the sound of 'many' trombones, and I picked it kind of at random. What does it mean for composition when the details of my instrumentation can be so wildly imprecise and arbitrary?"

 

You're overthinking it, a bit. If you HAVE 66 trombones, then you can compose whatever would be impossible without them. Aside from a few ground breakers like Delia Derbyshire, what musician has ever turned away from a better instrument or an improved tool?

 

"To compose" is the ongoing process whereby I amble around in a partial fog, mentally grappling with my next musical move and then scowl into my monitor, laying it down to within the limits of my faulty memory. If I didn't have Logic and tried to do things on paper, it would only be a matter of time before the cops would be throwing a net over me for running nude through an F-mart, laughing madly. Run-on sentence much? Sorry! Hell, its not even a proper verb.

 

Replicable. Hm. I think I'll defer to ProfD, in that the audio file is what we HAVE now. Yes, you can still devise sheet music for a band, but even then, good bleeping luck if its very synth-heavy. The idea of listing the synths you used, the sound set & patch numbers and the performance routings such as MPE = a major "Rick & Morty" sci-fi nightmare. I think you can loosely expect to start seeing MPE notes, such as "flute>oboe pressure, volume>slide up, vibrato side>side." Imperfect instructions, yeah, but also fairly solid. 

  

Replicating works from sheet music has largely fallen out of practice outside academia because of e-music gear. Unless you're going for something such as a string quartet performance, files are the new multitrack tapes. Even those start shedding and caving to the Weiss domains effect eventually. I wonder how the tapes in Frank Zappa's vaults are doing? Even if archived, who is going to listen to them in depth unless a musicology department has a burst of interest in them? Just enjoy your data while you're alive to sweat over it.

 

[Docbop]

I'm tired so (hopefully) a simple answer.    I was a recording engineer back in the 70's analog days zero computers and autolocate on tape decks was a new thing when I was getting out. Back then recording was all about capturing what went down in the studio and getting it on tape so it could be later mixed and all the secret sauce of EQ, reverb, and a few other tricks applied.   

 

Fast forward today and now the recording studio itself is an instrument be it someone at home, or big names in a commercial studio.  The function of all roles have changed.   What a songwriter, producer, tracking engineer, mixing engineer, mastering engineer, are all specialized roles unless your in a home studio.    The one that threw me was the definition of a producer today which is really the songwriter, but songs are now assembled using multiple producers.    I even heard songwriter talking about this and saying you have to as for a producer credit to be taken seriously. I was checking out a talk yesterday and now engineers are asking for points on project.   

 

It's a different world and the studio is a instrument the same as a violin, or a conga drum. A simple song will have close to a hundred tracks.  It's not the Beatle on two eight track recorders making Sgt Peppers. 

[ProfD]

There's no shortage of compositions between printed music and recordings already. 

 

I've got Real Books and CDs and vinyl filled with music.

 

Yet, every generation composes, produces and records their own music.

 

Unless someone is paying, a piece of music has to really be of interest on some level for other musicians to want to play it.😎